Reno stumbled blindly through the harrowing sandstorm, his muscles straining to move against the strong winds, his lungs burning, his mind in a constant panic from deep within, and stacked upon it the just newly acquired fear of falling victim to a dreadful tornado at an unknown distance behind him.

He didn't exactly know where it was, but he could hear it rumbling from the depths of the sand clouds behind him, like an omen of death.

Reno had never before felt the fear of death so intense as right now. Well, he had once, when Dr. Dieb had been lowered into the crevice of the destroyed building not too long ago. But to be fair, it was not really the fear of death, more so the fear of losing Dieb to the darkness in the ruins and waking something up that shouldn't be.

Still, it was comparable to the fear he felt right now.

He never looked back. He just just ran on and on, as far as his legs would be able to take him.

Finally, he reached the slope of the massive dune. He had somehow found it. It should have been located not more than a hundred meters away from his tent. So that meant…

He hadn't come very far.

But Reno didn't stop at this realization; instead, he sprinted up the sandy slope of the dune.

This test of endurance and strength was unlike anything he had experienced before. The physical strain and discomfort he felt while climbing up the hill were way worse than any all-nighters he had pulled back in med school.

His anxiety-riddled mind, in a desperate attempt to survive, pushed him forward even though something pushed him away at the same time: the darkness deep in his heart, the bad premonition, irrational and unnatural.

After a few minutes of intense struggle, he reached the top of the dune, almost surprised he had made it this far. Then he stepped onto the downward slope of the dune and staggered.

His foot had somehow toppled over itself and made his body roll over.

Without being able to stop the motion of the fall, he tumbled down the slope.

His body ached as it hit the ground countless times, swirling up sand in its wake, which was picked up by the winds and scattered in the air with the other sand already in it.

After rolling for a while, he came to a stop at the bottom of the hill. A haggard breath escaped his lips.

Even though his whole body ached terribly, Reno didn't allow himself to remain still for very long. The tornado was still behind him, already climbing the opposite side of the dune. He could hear its furious roar across the top, the winds serving as a communication line for the terrifying sound.

'I can't stop … what do I do…'

He stood up, his whole body staggering, when he moved his muscles.

"Argh.."

He groaned and continued his escape.

His mind was trying to find a way out, but there was no way he would be able to escape the tornado forever by just running away. Reno would eventually lose his remaining strength or be swept up in its wake because he was too slow.

As he moved forward, now way slower than before, a desperate hope still lingered in his mind.

Maybe if he found the others—his father, his brother, and Dr. Dieb—there would be a chance for survival. That hope was irrational and unreasonable.

Why would he be saved even if he reached them? If he was swept up in the storm, they would be, too.

The helicopter would be no escape way either, as there was no way it would be able to fly away during these winds and bad visibility. Of course, the fact that it was located on the other side of the valley didn't make it better.

Vehicles? He had never gotten his driver's license, and there was no way for him to locate them through the sand clouds either way.

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A new dawn appeared in his mind. He would die here.

Reno paled and felt sick to his stomach, wanting to vomit but he didn't as another thought crossed his mind.

There was still the feeling of the rising unease when he neared the ruins.

'And what about it? The ruins are the very reason I wanted to leave so badly …'

He ground his teeth while moving forward in the dark of the storm. The light was slowly dwindling even more. The sun had started moving beyond the horizon. He needed a solution fast, but there was none.

As he was drowning in despair, knowing his last hopes were no hopes at all and that this was probably his end, he suddenly felt a shadow before him.

Reno raised his head, and for a moment, he froze in place.

Not far away, only a few meters, a deep pit loomed in the sandy ground, and the winds seemingly turned silent when he looked too long in its direction.

He remained standing like this for a few moments and thought.

'Could this be …'

Reno tiredly shook his head, his unnatural unease rising in his heart once more.

'No way, no way.'

The winds were making his clothes dance wildly as if they had a life of their own. For a bystander, he might have looked like one of the mythical desert spirits in manifested form.

His internal thoughts, though, reflected the reality of things. He definitely wasn't; otherwise, he wouldn't have drowned in a torrent of negative emotions and rising, extremely desperate hopes once. But these new hopes were terrifying, truly so.

Torn between wanting to survive and his irrational fear of what was hidden in the darkness of the ruins, Reno had to make a decision. It should be decided rather fast, as the rumbling of the tornado neared with each passing second.

Finally, his face twisted into a grimace, and he turned around in the direction of the tornado.

'I'm a paranoid and life-loving person, but I'm also rational. If I wait here for the tornado, I'm definitely done for. But the weird feelings I'm experiencing are caused by an unknown source … so it is logical to choose the only way where I at least have a slight chance of survival. This is the only way …'

What he did next took all of his mental strength, and it required him to not only ignore his instincts but also rebel against something akin to primal fear.

Reno ground his teeth even harder, turned around, and mobilized his last bits of strength to make a sprint for the pit.

He had only one chance: to reach the dome of the massive building, he had to jump over the distance of the pit dug around it.

Reno reached the edge of the pit in only a second and exerted all his remaining power while simultaneously putting the metallic suitcase in front of his stomach and rips as a makeshift shield.

His mind and body were acting in unison.

Holding it with both hands, his arms wrapped around it, he pushed his body off the sandy edge.

His eyes couldn't see far ahead, so he estimated the distance and location of the roof. Fortunately, it was pretty big, and he didn't miss his mark.

With adrenaline still flooding through his veins, his arms, hands, and the metallic suitcase hit the fragile dome's structure.

Reno heard the loud crack of ancient sandstone, and a sudden pain flooded his extremities, which were used as a ramp. Luckily, most of his body was protected by the metal frame of the medical case.

But now, the thing he had dreaded so much took control over him almost in an instant. As his body fell through the roof of the building and the terrifying darkness enveloped him, his mind was taken over by irresistible anxiety and fear so deep his whole body shivered, starting to convulse even.

His arms and legs grabbed the case so hard they were turning bloodless, not letting go as it was the only thing to hold onto.

His eyes dilated as much as never before in his life.

Reno lost control over his already fragile state of mind completely, only his fight and flight instincts remaining. And even those turned dark after a split second as he lost consciousness.

This whole turn of events only took a few seconds, and as he fell, his figure was swallowed by the shadows inside the building.

...

...

...

Darkness.

Reno's entire body ached, a deep, throbbing pain that seemed to radiate from every inch of his skin. It felt as though someone had beaten him black and blue, leaving no part of him unscathed. Even his buttocks hurt, resting on a hard surface of stone, an absurd detail that somehow registered through the fog of pain.

But there was something else—an eerie calm that had settled over his mind, a strange contrast to the turmoil that had consumed him only moments before. The fear was still there, lingering at the edges of his thoughts, but it was muted now, like a distant echo.

Slowly, Reno opened his eyes, only to squeeze them shut again as dust threatened to blind him. His lungs burned with each breath, and he coughed, the sound harsh and ragged in the silence.

The pain intensified, a wave of agony that made him groan aloud. The sound echoed off unseen walls, reverberating through the space around him. Reno endured the pain, his mind slowly adjusting to it, allowing him to focus on his surroundings.

When he finally managed to open his eyes again, he realized he was in a vast underground chamber. The space was so large that he couldn't see its walls, only the faint glow of moonlight filtering through the shattered dome high above. Sand particles floated in the beam of light, creating a scene that would have been almost magical under different circumstances.

His gaze drifted from the chamber's dark vastness to his own body. He was lying on a small hill of sand, his clothes torn and bloodied, exposing skin that was bruised and battered. His left arm was in terrible shape, twisted and broken in multiple places, with bone fragments jutting out through the skin.

"Ah...not good," Reno muttered to himself, a grim understatement of the situation he found himself in.